Apple TV and Streaming? (1 Viewer)

Would the Apple TV be a good choice for streaming to my AVR from my IOS devices? I know it does other things, but that would be my first use of it?
I should mention the streaming would be mostly my ripped CDs.
Is 3rd generation the latest?

Yes and Yes.

Definitely. I do this as well.
And yes, 3rd gen is the latest.

Do you hookup to the AVR via HDMI? What quality sound can it support?

http://www.apple.com/appletv/

So far, I have not been able to find an answer to a question. The Apple TV has HDMI and optical ports. If I hook up to my AVR with HDMI, is there any need for the optical port? Will the HDMI take care of all sound? If I'm using airplay to listen to music on my iPhone will the HDMI provide that?

Johnny,

Off the top of my head, the HDMI cable should serve both your
audio and video feeds.

Originally Posted by Johnny Angell /t/324531/apple-tv-and-streaming#post_3999825
So far, I have not been able to find an answer to a question. The Apple TV has HDMI and optical ports. If I hook up to my AVR with HDMI, is there any need for the optical port? Will the HDMI take care of all sound? If I'm using airplay to listen to music on my iPhone will the HDMI provide that?

Click to expand...

HDMI will handle both. You basically use the Optical if you are going straight to the TV with your HDMI and your reciever only takes in Optical not HDMI Audio. there are a lot of receivers that will not decode the bitstream from HDMI (read: HTIB configurations)

Excellent. My receiver handles HDMI just fine. Thanks for the answers guys.

You'll love your AppleTv. It's awesome.

I installed my appletv yesterday and got it running. One of the early things I did was try out the trailer app. Most of the trailers would pause during playback because it wasn't downloading quick enough. This makes me wonder what it would be like to tent a movie. Is it going to have multiple pauses?
I haven't set it up to stream music from my iPhone yet, which was a major incentive for getting the device.
What are your favorite uses for the appletv?
When I was setting up the wifi connection, it found many more networks in the area than any of my other devices such as phones, computers, etc. have ever fond. I think there were well over 10 and maybe close to 20. That was a surprise.

What kind of isp do you have? Have you run a speedtest lately? What kind of response are you getting

I have AT&T DSL. Can you recommend a good speed test site? That works in safari?

Johnny,

http://www.speedtest.net/index.php

Then you can share your speed test results.
With my ISP speeds, I have no issues with streaming any content from the internet using my appleTV

I a big difference: Download-5.14 mb/s, upload-.64 mb/s, Ping-32 ms
Grade D.
If I may pry, are paying for an upgraded access level, or is mine just that slow?

I have T-Mobile 4G internet(just switched from Sprint since my device crapped and they no longer had an unlimited plan to my liking)
My speed is routinely 120+ KBPS. Every once in a while it will fly along at 165 KBPS. It has hit as much as 200 for 10-15 minutes.

Sam I've done my test twice with the same results. When I convert the results of mb/s to kbps I come up with 5263.36 kbps. It would seem that my dsl exceeds your T-mobile. You didn't mention if you were using the T-mobile for your AppleTV?
Richard, your speed seems remarkably high. Is that an upgraded level of internet access that you are paying extra for?

Yeah his is triple my 35/35 FiOS, that's pretty sharp.
Even with 35/35 I get shitty download speeds from Youtube. I have no idea why. Everything else flies.
DSL in general can be frustrating tho....

I'm on cable internet. I have the level above basic to allow for more bandwidth usage per month for $10 extra/mth. Even at the basic though, I was getting 20+mb/s.
Your dl speed seems very very low. Check that, I just checked the AT&T site and that seems to be what you should be expected from your DSL package. I knew that dsl speeds were lower than cable, but did not know it was that much.

That said, even at 5mb/s, you should be able to stream video content without significant issues. Most streaming HD content would fall between 4-8mb/s (from what I've read and experienced), so you may have some buffering issues with less compressed, and longer HD content.